Are you wondering what we mean when we talk about “land subdivision?” It’s not the simplest thing to explain, but we did our best to boil it down in our newest short film.

Together, we can prevent a shattered landscape.

Amboseli is crossed by ancient lines, paths worn by animals migrating across the landscape in search of food and water. There are no barriers between national parks and community lands, and animals need both to survive.

Now, new lines threaten to strangle Amboseli as land is subdivided into privately-owned plots. The result will be a shattered landscape and a collapse of wildlife populations.

We can prevent this. By leasing their land to Big Life, people earn income and community lands stay open for wildlife. This is working in the Kimana wildlife corridor. Now, we must replicate this across the ecosystem.

Subdivision is spreading rapidly, and we are at a critical turning point. With your help we can protect Amboseli’s wild spaces. Please support us. Donate at biglife.org/paolo.

Credits:

Film Editing & Post-Production: Mieke Vlaming
Cinematography: Oli Caldow, Black Bean Productions
Composer: Zain Wolf
Sound Mixing: Juice Audio
Music Licensing: MamaDance, CAPASSO
Color: Apache Digital
Online Editor: Daniëlle Nel
Graphic Designer: Matthew Griffiths
For Big Life: Nick Brandt, Jeremy Goss, Amy Baird, Kim Schwalb

Paolo has a problem: he can’t own land.

He can’t own land because he can’t get an ID, and he can’t get an ID because he’s an elephant.

He’s not just any elephant, he is one of Africa’s biggest tuskers, meaning each of his enormous tusks weighs 100 pounds or more. He was born in 1979 and at 44 years old is in the prime of his life.

Most of the giants like Paolo have fallen, killed by poachers for their increasingly rare ivory. There are likely fewer than 50 remaining tuskers across all of Africa. But in Amboseli, where at least 9 of these giants live, Paolo has been protected by rangers who come from the human communities that he lives alongside.

Njoroke ole Mpere is a leader of one of these Maasai communities. He is of the same generation as Paolo, born only ten years prior. They have survived the same droughts and enjoyed the same times of plenty.

They share more than a generation: they share a home.

Mpere’s livestock and Paolo range widely across this natural paradise, moving in search of food and water as the seasons change. Amboseli National Park is an oasis at the center, home to the life-giving springs and swamps that keep animals – both wild and domestic – alive through the dry season.

But the park is too small to support all of these animals on a permanent basis, and their habitats extend far beyond its boundaries. If animals cannot move freely, they die. It’s that simple.

When animals leave the park, they move through favored routes known as migration corridors, land that is currently owned by the local Maasai communities, but this is changing.

One of the most important of these is the Nairrabala corridor. This vast 37,500-acre area borders Amboseli National Park to the north. Almost 40% the size of Amboseli, it has been used by wildlife throughout history to access key feeding grounds. This is where Mpere lives, and a core part of Paolo’s home range.

Njoroke ole Mpere

If there’s one thing elephants need, it’s space. Without land for giants like Paolo to roam, the ecosystem – and its wildlife – will collapse. Right now, this land is under threat, and we need your help.

The Amboseli ecosystem, including Nairrabala, is being chopped up and subdivided from communally-owned land into tens of thousands of individually-owned parcels.

Now, land is available for anyone to own, and outside buyers (including international developers) don’t necessarily want to share with wildlife, local communities, or livestock. They want to erect fences with ‘Keep Out’ signs.

This is the source of the problem shared by Paolo and Mpere.

To keep this extremely important piece of habitat undeveloped and wild, we are partnering with local communities and offering conservation land leases. Under these voluntary agreements, we will pay lease fees to individual landowners. In return, wildlife can continue to move freely, and landowners will retain full shared access to the area for livestock grazing, while prohibiting fencing and unsustainable uses.

It’s the ultimate win-win.

Paolo’s history and above mapping data are thanks to the incredible work done by our partners at the Amboseli Trust for Elephants.

Nairrabala is located within Olgulului Ranch, which is a critical part of the ecosystem because it almost entirely encircles Amboseli National Park. Big Life provided wildlife protection on Olgulului for over a decade, until Olgulului assumed management of those conservation initiatives in 2018. With the emergence of this new threat to the Amboseli ecosystem, Big Life is renewing our partnership with Olgulului to counter it.

The bulldozers and tractors are lining up on the horizon. If we don’t lease Nairrabala, the land and all its inhabitants are at risk. You can help.

We need to raise at least $300,000 to protect it. Each acre costs just under $10 a year to lease, and your donation will help to cover the conservation lease fees paid to the 1,783 landowners for the coming year.

Honestly, this is just the start. Other critical areas will need to be leased by Big Life and our partners in the ecosystem to protect enough space for wildlife. But right now, Nairrabala is the most urgently threatened piece of the puzzle.

Paolo’s problem is a big one, but it can be solved.

Nairrabala Corridor

If you send a donation today, we can protect Nairrabala and Amboseli’s most important wildlife habitats, maintaining this ecosystem as a haven for giants.

Please donate and join us in taking this next important step. Paolo can’t thank you, but we will.

DONATE TODAY

Images graciously provided by:
James Lewin: Paolo
Jeremy Goss: Njoroke ole Mpere
Philip J. Briggs: Nairrabala Corridor
Amboseli Trust for Elephants: Paolo's history & mapping data

The rangers stared at the ground in disbelief. They decided that they must be imagining things, as tracks in coarse soils can be easy to misinterpret. The unit walked on, but with each step the excitement built.

Alongside one clear set of adult rhino tracks were smaller scuffs. Very small. Eventually there could be no more doubt: this was not one rhino but two. And number two was definitely a baby.

The ranger teams immediately set out to verify the newest addition on camera. Within a month, they were able to get these pictures of the tiny baby rhino alive and well.

This calf is a major event. The Eastern black rhino is critically endangered. There are estimated to be fewer than 1,000 remaining.

There are only 7 known individuals that live in the rugged and inaccessible area that we protect in close coordination with our partners at the Kenya Wildlife Service. They are some of the last wild and unfenced black rhinos in East Africa and the remnants of a population that we intend to re-establish as a stronghold for the species in Kenya.

Thanks to the rangers, we haven’t lost a single rhino to poachers in more than 8 years, but births have been rare in such a small population. Rhino calves are also extremely vulnerable at this age. We have lost calves before and are not naïve about this one’s chances, but we are allowing ourselves a moment to celebrate this tiny miracle.

These are the successes that make it all worthwhile, particularly the hard work done by the Big Life and KWS rangers in extremely challenging conditions. We also appreciate and thank all supporters of our rhino program over the years, particularly the long-term commitments from USFWS and Chester Zoo, and recent partners at Royal African Safaris.

The odds may be stacked against this small calf, but we’ll give it the best chance we can.

844 people is a big guest list for a party, but this was a party worth throwing.

It was the official opening of Angama Amboseli, Big Life’s tourism partner in the Kimana Sanctuary. All 844 community landowners of the Sanctuary were invited, as were partners and stakeholders from the ecosystem and beyond.

The launch of this unique 10-suite lodge is just the start of something, but to us it feels like the happy end of a long road. After initial tourism businesses went bust in the early 2000s the Sanctuary scraped along, and when Big Life took over management in 2018 tourist visitors were rare.

With funding from the Sheldrick Wildlife Trust and DN Batten Foundation we paid the annual land lease, and invested in conservation programs and tourism infrastructure. We built campsites and a self-catering guesthouse and started to market to local travellers, all of whom we greatly appreciate for their support over the years.

Word of the Sanctuary spread and one day our new friends from Angama came down for a drive. The three-way partnership that has evolved since then is a model of what we are trying to achieve through our habitat protection initiatives across the Amboseli ecosystem.

A community provides the land, a tourism partner runs a world-class tourism business that generates revenue to fund conservation, and Big Life manages those conservation initiatives. Everyone does what they do best.

Angama Amboseli is showing the world what a responsible tourism company looks like, and their financial support is already covering the entire land lease as well as a contribution to conservation programs. As guest numbers increase, at some point in the not too distant future we will achieve full financial sustainability of conservation in Kimana Sanctuary, a very exciting prospect!

Welcome Angama Amboseli and congratulations on your opening, we look forward to what comes next.

Photos: Jeremy Goss